Posts Tagged ‘regime’

Text of the Anarchist Political Organization, calling for solidarity gatherings to the anarchists, members of DAF (Anarchist Revolutionary Action), imprisoned by the fascist regime of Turkey.

Anarchist prisoner Umut Firat Suvariogullari, writer of the newspaper Meydan, who has been confined for the last 23 years, is on hunger strike since the 13th of December 2016 in the prison type T in Yenisakran of Smyrna, denouncing the State of Emergency declared by the Turkish state and the inhuman conditions of imprisonment imposed to all political prisoners. A prison within prison through debarment of visitation, deprivation of all their rights as prisoners and continuous torture.

In the 23rd of December 2016, the court of Istanbul convicted Hüseyin Civan, editor-in-chief of the anarchist newspaper Meydan, of “terrorist propaganda” and in particular “of propaganda for the methods of a terrorist organization constituting coercion, violence or threats through legitimizing or praising or encouraging the use of these methods” and sentenced him to one year and three months in prison. The Chief Public Prosecutor’s office had ordered an investigation on the newspaper since December 2015, related to articles published in its 30th issue with the caption “Banning Everything”.

The imprisonment of Hüseyin Civan is part of the oppressive campaign of the Turkish state, which, during the last years, manifested itself through war in the Kurdish regions, mass persecutions and murderous attacks against movements of resistance and revolutionary organizations. This campaign has been further intensified after the unsuccessful coup d’état of last July and the extension of the state of emergency. Read the rest of this entry »

After several unsuccessful attempts of the Greek state to shutdown Athens Indymedia domestically, the regime has turned for assistance to the US repressive mechanisms. A few days ago the FBI, through orders by the US department of “Justice”, demanded from the US based administrators of the central indymedia.org server personal information of the contacts in Greece managing the Athens Indymedia subdomain. With this post we publish the statement of the administrative team, expressing our solidarity with Athens Indymedia, while asking all free and independent media to reproduce the news globally.

On Friday 12/9 Mayfirst collective, which houses part of Athens Indymedia’s infrastructure, informed us about a subpoena they received from the Department Of Justice of the U.S on an investigation conducted by the FBI. Specifically, the FBI demanded all personal data of subscribers using the IP addresses of Athens Indymedia (ie the members of the collective). No further explanation was given for this request and no investigation on the content of the server was mentioned. The request was, of course, not accepted by the Mayfirst collective despite the risks this action entails for its members and its infrastructure.

For us the request betrays, to a large extent, involvement of the Greek authorities. They are well aware that any search or seizure of our equipment wouldn’t endanger the users of Athens Indymedia or shut down the site. They haven’t managed to do so in over 14 years. We believe that this new attack exemplifies the strategy chosen by the state. By specifically targeting members of the collective they want to control and criminalize freedom of speech and dissemination of information as well as acts of social resistance. Read the rest of this entry »

On Sunday (Feb 10/2014) evening more than 500 people gathered to protest the installation on new tolls and their rising cost. Part of Malakasa toll booths to the North of Athens were torn off the ground and burned. These are the first of the many toll booths located on the highway between Athens and Thessaloniki (the 2nd largest city of Greece). This action came a few days after the new rates’ increases went in effect in many tolls and new toll stations were added on the only two main national highways leading to and from Athens. The particular toll station is one of few installed within the same municipality which is illegal under European Community Law.

Before the attack on the toll booths, demonstrators temporarily blocked all traffic and then asked employees inside the booths to leave. After employees left the booths they torched them, tearing some of them off the ground. After burning a good part of the toll booths, protesters, shouting slogans against the government and its policies, departed for the next toll station on the same highway, in the village of Afidnes, where they proceeded to a different action. They raised the bars and let passing vehicles through without paying for more than half an hour (photos: 1, 2).

Opening toll booths as a form of demonstration has for the past three years been very common. Also encouraging motorists not to pay and forming solidarity networks to fight violations in court has also been a common activity by grassroots organizations and political parties of the left. The construction tycoons of Greece who have been granted both all highway maintenance & construction contracts as well as exclusive private management, have forced the state to alter legislation to criminalize any form of protest or disobedience. Read the rest of this entry »